Coolah Roos spoil Cobar Roosters’ party

With two teams in this year’s Castlereagh  Rugby League grand finals, the Cobar Roosters were hoping it would be a double celebration when they hosted the big day at Tom Knight Memorial Oval on Saturday.

The Cobar Under 18s kicked off the celebrations early in the day with their thrilling 18-16 win over the Gulgong Bull Terriers in extra time in the Youth League match.

However the day didn’t finish in Cobar’s favour with the Coolah Roos celebrating their comeback to competition football with an emphatic 32-8 victory over the Roosters in First Grade.

The big day, which attracted a huge crowd to an immaculately presented ground, kicked off with the Reserve Grade match between Gilgandra Panthers and Baradine Magpies.

The game was a close one with the Panthers scoring four tries to the Magpies’ three to finish with a narrow 18-14 win.

Gilgandra’s Curtis Carr was named the Player of the Grand Final.

The crowd swelled just before the Under 18s match commenced as the Cobar Roosters ran on to play the Gulgong Bull Terriers.

Player of the Grand Final (and Castlereagh Youth League Player of the Year), Cobar’s Reece Josephson scored in extra time to help the Bantam Roosters to a thrilling 18-16 win.

(See full match report on Page 22.)

The Narromine Jets scored a late try to seal their 14-10 hard fought win over the Coolah Flyers in the Ladies League Tag grand final match.

Narromine’s Emily Edwards was the Player of the Grand Final with team mate Shian Chatfield named the League Tag Player of the Year.

The crowd was close to capacity when the Cobar First Grade side came out of the sheds to take on the Coolah Roos.

Both sides were keen to win but the Roos played a much superior game and took home the trophy with an emphatic 32-8 win.

The Roos’ Josh Charles was named Player of the Grand Final while the Castlereagh First Grade’s Player of the Year award went to Gulgong’s Brad James (for the third time).

Initially there was some nervousness by both Cobar and Coolah in the opening five minutes of the First Grade match with each team making early errors.

Coolah then settled in and started calling the shots as they crossed for three tries in quick succession.

By midway through the first half, the Roos had a commanding 16-0 lead.

It was easy to see why this team had dominated the competition all season. They had only lost one match all year and that was the final to Cobar two weeks ago.

Prior to Saturday’s re-match, Coolah had well and truly done their homework and they employed an array of very effective tactics that eroded away at the Cobar team’s strengths.

The Roos were quick to swarm all over any Roosters would-be try scorers—they knew their playing styles and the Cobar players were time and again held up before the line.

Cobar was forced to play catch up footy, which they knew from experience was not going to be the plan that would beat Coolah.

The Roosters however continued to “poke the bear” and 15 minutes out from the half time break, Nathan McAndrew managed to find a gap out wide on the left wing to open the scoring for Cobar.

With a Coolah player spending time in the sinbin, Tim Hillam made the most of an overlap to score Cobar’s second try soon after.

Both conversion attempts by Jimmy Neyland were waved away but Cobar was back in the game with the score at 16-8.

Coolah however crossed for another converted try just before half time to stretch their lead to 22-8.

For the first 20 minutes of the second half, neither side could improve on the score until Coolah broke through and crossed out wide.

The Roosters had no answers as the Roos continued to lift with the winners’ silverware firmly within their sights.

Four minutes out from full time, Coolah’s supporters began celebrating their win when Chanse Burgess touched down and Dan Lane converted to give them an unbeatable 32-8 lead which remained unchanged at full time.

Coolah’s Joshua Charles was named the Player of the Grand Final.